Yankee dime

n. a (perfunctory) kiss. Subjects: English, United States, Slang

Editorial Note: This term appears to originate in the South.

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Citations: 1846 Huron Reflector (Norwalk, Ohio) (Jan. 13) p. 3: If you’ll do me this favor in double quick time,/You shall have my best wishes and a Yankee dime. 1900 The Landmark (Statesville, N.C.) (Aug. 28) “A Great Day at Troutman’s” p. 3: When the boys and girls husked corn together and the boys hustled like the very mischief to get the first red ear—wonder why?—and then attended the girls home from these husking bees and night singings, bidding them good-night in the moonlight at the front gate and going home with a bran[d]-new Yankee dime, feeling prouder and more independent than any of the present generation. 1928 Indiana Weekly Messenger (Pa.) (June 7) “Colloquial” p. 6: “Yankee dime” is a slang term used in some sections of the United States, particularly in the South, to denote a kiss, just as “Dutch quarter” is used to mean a hug. In some sections “Quaker nickel” is employed in the same sense as “Yankee Dime.” 2004 Merle Kessler DBMT (San Francisco, California) (Sept. 29) “Yankee Dime”: Yankee Dime This is Texas slang, apparently (I read it in the Lone Star Iconoclast!) for an insincere kiss. President Bush sure knows how to spend those.

Posted 12 Oct 04 | Permalink | Tell a Friend

Reader comments:

Thanks for backing me up!

by Deana 26 Jul 06, 0632 GMT

Not Texas slang, but I’d be willing to bet it’s confined to Southern slang.

I was born and raised in Alabama.

When I was a little girl, my grandmother used to say, “Give me a Yankee dime.”

As I grew older, I forgot all about the phrase until she was dying. A man visiting her in the hospital leaned over her bed and said, “Give me a Yankee dime.”

Memories flooded my soul.

I now say the same words to my own granddaughter.

“Give me a Yankee dime.”

by Paige 06 Sep 07, 0623 GMT

I am 76 and we used this in Texas when I was young. I say it now and no one around me understands.

by Claude Davis 11 Nov 07, 0149 GMT

12/o3/1907
I am 81 and my mother would tell one of us 9 children she would give us a “yankee dime if we would do something for her. I ask my for a yankee dime and she did not know what I wanted. We lived in Nashville TN.
Herman Tucker

by Herman A Tucker 03 Dec 07, 0520 GMT

I’m 63 and raised in NW Tennessee and I heard it used as “kiss” when I was a child. Haven’t talked to many younger than me that have heard it and fewer north of there. I have no idea of origin, but suspect it might have indicated something of little value, like southerners would have thought of northern promises after the Civil War. Can’t imagine in the South during that time it being slang for anything of much value.

by ed ellis 13 Jan 08, 1053 GMT

Another Alabama girl.

My father would ask for a favor ("bring me a Coke, and I’ll give you a yankee dime").

I consistently “fell” for it until I was about nine, when I began to value kisses more than lucre.

by Beck 17 Mar 08, 0511 GMT

I grew up in Northeast Louisiana, and I can remember my best friend’s grandpa saying that to her. We both still use it sometimes, and we are only in our 20’s. None of our friends have ever heard of it, but they all think it is cute.

by Rachel 11 Apr 08, 0710 GMT

I won a yankee dime from my husband, then when I bragged about it at work no one knew what I was talking about. I then tried to find anyone who knew what a yankee dime was and “NO ONE” (out of 30-40 people) knew what it meant. I’m from Alabama and my dad gave out a lot of yankee dimes! Connie 4/23/08

by Connie Jones 23 Apr 08, 0500 GMT